At the Sign of the Green Baize Door
by LauraHuntORI
Summary: Think of Downstairs as a local pub: lots of company, good friends, not-so-good friends, food, drink, music, strict landlord, kindly landlady, fiery red-headed cook. Home. Now imagine you've been banned for life, because of the wife you've chosen, and who's chosen you. Do you drink up and find another pub? Or try to figure out a way back into the landlord's good graces?
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: ** I'm not sure where I'm going with this. Expect the story to jump around in time a bit. This chapter is set during Season 3, after Sybbie's birth and Sybil's death.

**Disclaimer:** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

Mrs. Patmore looked up to see the object of her thoughts standing in the doorway to the kitchen.

"Mrs. Patmore," Mr. Branson said, quietly. "If it isn't too much trouble, I'd like you to show me where Sybbie's things are, and how you're preparing food for her."

"There's no need for that, Mr. Branson." The cook knew she was technically supposed to call him 'sir' now, but his name had just come out. Old habits died hard. "We're happy to take care of it."

"I know. And I'm grateful, truly. But… I'm her father, and I need to know as well." A ghost of a smile appeared on his pale features. "Sometime she might get hungry when everyone else is busy, and if that happens, you won't want to take the time to show me what to do and where things are kept."

Mrs. Patmore considered. Mr. Carson had made it plain that the former chauffeur was no longer welcome in the servant's hall. He had made himself part of the 'family' and should keep himself upstairs and like it.

"Please," Mr. Branson said.

Well, after all, the _kitchen _wasn't the servants' hall. And Mrs. Patmore herself was the one to say who was welcome in the kitchen. "Very well, Mr. Branson. Miss Sybbie's bottles are kept in that cupboard there, and the nursers are over here," she showed him, "and if you'll sit down at the desk, you can read the pamphlet on the 'Percentage Method' that Dr. Clarkson sent over for yourself."

His faint smile took on a little more substance, and the tiniest portion of his gloom seemed to lift. "Thank you, Mrs. Patmore." He sat down at the desk, and opened the pamphlet she handed him. The cook resumed her interrupted task.

Branson was still reading when Daisy walked in. "Mr. Branson," she said in surprise. Apparently the kitchen staff had a mental block concerning the currently officially sanctioned mode of address for their former colleague.

Branson looked up, comforted as he always was when anyone said his name, rather than the hated 'sir.' "Daisy," he greeted her.

"Mr. Branson wants us to help him learn to prepare bottles for Miss Sybbie. We'll help him with that, won't we, Daisy?"

Daisy looked at the former chauffeur approvingly. "Of course we will."


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note: ** This chapter begins on the night of Thursday, 29 May 1913.

**Disclaimer:** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

Most of the servants had gone to the fair in the village, but the lady's maid and the valet were still at the table, and the cook and at least one hall boy were still in the kitchen. Branson excused himself, and ventured back into the cook's domain.

"Mrs. Patmore?" he asked.

The short, buxom red-head regarded him in surprise. "Mr. Branson, isn't it?"

The new chauffeur nodded.

_Why was he in her kitchen? _Mrs. Patmore sincerely hoped he would not turn out to be another Mr. Taylor. She had had quite enough of—

"I just wanted to say that I thought dinner was wonderful, and that I appreciate your hard work in preparing it."

Mrs. Patmore stared at him for an instant, then seeing the rosy blush starting to rise on his pale features, said, "Did you indeed?"

He nodded.

"Well, it was my pleasure to prepare it. As well as my duty." She bit back a smile.

The boy looked away, embarrassed. "Well, again, thank you, Mrs. Patmore."

"You're quite welcome, Mr. Branson," she said, releasing her smile as he escaped back to the servants' hall.

* * *

"Mrs. Patmore," Mrs. Hughes said a few days later, "can you step into my sitting room for a moment?"

"Certainly, Mrs. Hughes." The cook shot a look at Daisy, then started out into the downstairs hall. Mrs. Patmore was not one to automatically suppose that every private conversation was a reprimand, but the possibility _did _exist: after all, why would Mrs. Hughes need privacy? In the general way of things, Mrs. Patmore had no business with the housekeeper that her staff could not hear.

She entered the housekeeper's sitting room to find the new chauffeur there. Mrs. Patmore regarded the two with a kindling eye.

"Mrs. Patmore, we have a proposition for you." Mrs. Hughes began.

Mrs. Patmore glared at the chauffeur. So _this _was how it was, was it? She well remembered the last 'proposition' regarding a chauffeur. Mr. Taylor, in his quest to become a cook fit to run a _tea shop _of all things, had managed to rub the cook the wrong way on s_everal_ occasions.

Mrs. Patmore had no problem with a man wanting to learn to cook; some of the best cooks were men. Still, the kitchen at Downton belonged to Mrs. Patmore, she wanted things done her way, and she _hardly _needed a chauffeur to tell her how to go on. Did she go out to the garage and tell them how to drive or tend the motors? "There's a kitchen in the chauffeur's cottage, is there not?" she growled.

If Mrs. Patmore had thought the Irishman had blushed the other night in the kitchen, it was nothing to the color he achieved now. He bit his lip and looked at the floor.

Mrs. Hughes glanced over at the boy. "There is, in fact." She looked back at the cook. "But Mr. Branson suggested it might be easier if he stayed in the servants' hall on the nights the Dowager dines here, rather than our having to send someone to fetch him when her ladyship is ready to leave, and I agree with him. We can square it between the house and garage accounts, but Mr. Branson was concerned you might feel you were being taken advantage of."

The chauffeur looked up, and met cook's eyes with the sweetest, shyest, most wistful smile she had ever seen. "If it's too much trouble, Mrs. Patmore, I understand."

One corner of the cook's mouth curled up. "Oh, I suppose it's not too much trouble to feed one more hungry lad amongst the multitude here."

The housekeeper turned to the chauffeur. "Satisfied?"

He nodded.

"Off you go then."

"Thank you, Mrs. Hughes, Mrs. Patmore."

"Mr. Branson?" Mrs. Patmore said as he passed her.

He stopped. "Yes, Mrs. Patmore?"

"I trust you'll remember not to bite the hand that feeds you?"

"I'll remember," he assured her.


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note:** _A baby is God's opinion that life should go on._ –Carl Sandburg

We are back in Season 3, after the Sybbie's Christening, but before the cricket match.

**Disclaimer:** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

Mr. Carson sat at the desk in the butler's pantry, working on his accounts, and mulling over the fact that the person with whom he would be reviewing these figures come quarter day would be… Mr. Branson. That would be a 'day of reckoning' indeed.

There had been no great love lost between the butler and the previous agent, but Mr. Jarvis had held the post throughout the entirety of Mr. Carson's own tenure with the Crawley family, so he had at least been well used to Mr. Jarvis' ways, even if the agent had at times given himself airs beyond what Mr. Carson felt to be appropriate for an agent. Still, the two men, colleagues of long standing and of similar age, had paid each other the compliment of a very formal kind of mutual respect.

Now his 'superior,' the agent of their mutual 'master' was… the former chauffeur.

Mr. Carson had never been as close to Lady Sybil as he was to Lady Mary, but still, he had known the young woman her entire life, had rejoiced in her triumphs, had been deeply wounded by her rejection of all she had previously known in order to vanish into the west with Mr. Branson, and now felt her loss deeply. If his grief was not as deep as that of a father for a daughter, it came as close as he could come to it, since the young Crawley ladies were the closest thing he had to daughters.

Mr. Branson, on the other hand, had done the unforgivable: appropriated to himself what rightfully belonged to his employer: his very daughter. (Of course, he himself had once stolen from his lordship when Mr. Grigg had come to Downton… and when the matter came to light, his lordship had not even been angry.) Still, as much as he sympathized with the boy's loss, he was finding it hard to forgive the betrayal of his sacred trust.

Despite his unresolved anger towards the young Irishman, or perhaps because of it, Mr. Carson was determined that the young man would have no cause to reproach him regarding either his management of the house or his recordkeeping. He had just finished a careful correction to one of the wine book entries, when he became conscious of a loud commotion in the kitchen. It sounded like laughter. How dare they?! This was still a house of mourning! Had they no shame?! Mr. Carson swept out of the butler's pantry like an avenging angel with a view to putting a stop to the unseemly mirth.

* * *

Mr. Branson deposited Sybbie in Gabriel's waiting arms, then moved the boy's hands into a better position to hold the infant securely. "She can't hold her head up for herself yet," he said, "so you have to support it for her like this." He moved the hall boy's hand gently into position. "You don't want her head flopping around on her neck," the agent teased, glancing at the cook. "Mrs. Patmore wouldn't like it."

The boy still looked a little nervous. He was the youngest in his family, and wasn't used to babies. But he was holding the child correctly, so Mr. Branson smiled encouragement and approval. "That's very good, Gabriel. You're a natural. You'll make a wonderful father someday: any girl will be lucky to have a boy who knows how to hold their babies." Gabriel smiled shyly at the agent's praise, and cuddled the infant closer.

Mr. Branson resumed his conversation with Mrs. Patmore, which had been interrupted by the hall boy's entrance and subsequent initiation into the art and mystery of baby holding. "Mam always says a baby should be held by as many different people as possible. Let's her get used to being handled so she doesn't start squalling—" suddenly the noise of talk and laughter was drowned out by the bellow of Mr. Carson's voice, "What is going on in here?!" at the same time Mr. Branson was finishing, "—anytime she's out of her mother's arms."

In the unquiet silence, every person present was thinking, 'This child will never be IN her mother's arms.'

Mrs. Patmore licked her lips. "Mr. Carson," she began, "I—" she saw Mr. Branson shaking his head and making a warding gesture with one hand. He would handle it. Mrs. Patmore closed her mouth.

Mr. Branson walked to Gabriel, smiled at the boy, and gently took his child back into his own arms.

Mrs. Patmore thought he would leave. Instead, he walked straight up to the butler. "Mr. Carson," he greeted the older man.

"Mr. Branson," the butler acknowledged the agent noncommittally.

"Would you like to hold her?" Mr. Branson lifted Sybbie towards Mr. Carson, and to Mrs. Patmore's surprise, the butler reached without hesitation to accept her. He smiled at the child, and jiggled her gently, but Mr. Branson noticed the older man was careful to provide support for the child's head. "She looks just like her mother," the butler cooed. "What a little beauty you are!"

Mr. Branson smiled beatifically in total agreement.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note: ** The first part of this chapter begins on the same day as Chapter 1, after Branson has left the kitchen. The remainder occurs after Chapter 3, but still before the cricket match.

**Disclaimer:** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

Mrs. Patmore had noticed Mr. Branson writing something in the Percentage Method pamphlet, and when he left the kitchen she went to the desk and flipped through the pages curiously to see what he had written. On the recipe page, he had crossed out the word 'honey,' and written in large block capital letters across that page's top margin "DO NOT FEED MY DAUGHTER HONEY. IT WOULD GIVE HER COLIC. *See Notes Page."

Mrs. Patmore was intrigued. What did Mr. Branson know about babies? She turned obediently to the Notes Page at the back of the pamphlet. On this page, Mr. Branson had written "An infant should not be given honey until she can walk well enough to outrun a bee." Underneath that sentence he had inscribed two additional recipes: one gave the proportions to dilute Rose's Lime Juice Cocktail for an infant, and the other was a very mild chamomile tisane.

Daisy appeared suddenly at her elbow. "What's that?"

Mrs. Patmore showed her what the former chauffeur had written.

"Why does he think honey would give her colic?" Daisy asked.

"I don't know… He's an interesting man, our Mr. Branson."

* * *

Nanny came down to the kitchen, and since Daisy and Mrs. Patmore were busy, she set about preparing a bottle for Miss Sybbie herself. Consulting the 'Percentage Method' pamphlet kept in Mrs. Patmore's desk, she fetched some honey to add to the milk.

Mrs. Patmore, busy with her own tasks, saw what the girl was doing. Nanny was the older sister of the maid who'd been drafted into the nursery on the night of Miss Sybbie's birth. She was perhaps over young for a nanny in Mrs. Patmore's opinion, but she had not been consulted about the girl's hiring, and up to now she had caused no trouble. But what was the honey for?

Daisy had noticed as well. "Should you be doing that?"

"Why not?" Nanny asked. "It says to in the pamphlet."

"But Mr. Branson wrote—"

"I suppose he doesn't know more about it than the doctor?" Nanny pointed out.

Mrs. Patmore shrugged. It was no skin off hers. "Well, dear, if there's a problem, _you _can explain it to him."

Daisy looked at the cook dubiously, but they were both busy, and Nanny was not under their direction. The young woman, having prepared the bottle, left the kitchen and the cook and assistant cook got on with their own duties.

* * *

Mr. Branson's welcome at The Sign of the Green Baize Door, such as it was, extended from the eponymous door itself, down the backstairs, and into the kitchen, but nowhere else, and even though he was now the agent, had keys to everything, and technically had the right and authority to be anywhere he wished, he apparently wished to keep out of Mr. Carson's way (or on his good side) and so, unless he had a business reason to be downstairs, kept himself exclusively to those areas where Mrs. Patmore's writ and protection ran.

Accordingly, Thomas Barrow had seen the former chauffeur downstairs only when he was in the kitchen showing off his child or preparing food for her. Nonetheless, literally _every _denizen of the servants' hall had held the child at least once by this time, and Thomas was no exception. Lady Sybil's daughter was a miracle to Thomas. Such a tiny, perfect little creature. Beautiful, as Thomas did not normally find infants beautiful, because when he looked at her, he remembered her mother's kindness. Mr. Branson, for all he was now a 'member of the family' and the agent to boot, seemed remarkably unchanged. A little less sure of himself and his place, perhaps, but by no means 'jumped up' or too grand. Thomas concluded he must have married Lady Sybil because he _loved _her. Somehow it seemed a strange thing to contemplate.

Anyway, when Thomas heard a baby cry, and the swift passage of bodies down the stairs and into the kitchen, from his seat at the long table in the servants' hall, he concluded it must be Baby Sybbie and her father and/or nanny, as indeed it was. Thomas, having no urgent tasks, wandered into the kitchen after them. Miss Sybbie was _shrieking _as though she were being murdered. He leaned in the doorway to the kitchen to observe.

* * *

Mr. Branson, carrying his squalling daughter, set down a nursing bottle which was a little more than half full on the long kitchen work table. "Somebody tell me who prepared this bottle," he said. He turned towards the door and saw Thomas. "Mr. Barrow," he greeted him, in evident relief. "Are you busy, or can you help me for a few minutes?"

Thomas, surprised, stuttered, "Yes, I'd be glad to help, if I can."

Sybbie screamed earnestly. The former chauffeur handed his daughter to the former first footman/former valet. Thomas instinctively drew her close and tried to comfort her. The appalled nanny stood off to the side thunderstruck, while the agent set about getting another bottle and rubber nurser out.

"Somebody start telling me about that bottle," Branson repeated, snappily, expertly locating Mrs. Patmore's stash of dried chamomile blossoms and an earthenware vessel to steep them in. He drew hot water from the boiler and added it to the pot.

Nanny looked at Mrs. Patmore and Daisy, who looked blandly back at her. "I prepared it," the girl admitted in a whisper.

Branson was filling the new baby bottle about two thirds of the way full with water from the filter jar. When he'd finished he set it down. "How many infants have you dry nursed?" he asked her.

"Miss Sybbie is the first one."

"I see," he said. "How did you know what to feed her?" He added chamomile tea to the water in his bottle, fastened on the lid, then tested the temperature against his wrist.

It was clear to Mrs. Patmore that Mr. Branson already knew what was in the first bottle. It was equally clear that Nanny knew she did not have good answers to the questions he was undoubtedly about to ask. But she had no other answers to give.

"The pamphlet…" she began.

"Ah, yes, the pamphlet. So you can read, then?"

Mrs. Patmore felt profoundly grateful that she had not prepared that bottle. The Irishman's usually gentle voice, though not raised, was as sharp as a fileting knife, the edge of his anger so keen, the cook reflected, you might find yourself bleeding all over the floor before you even realized you were cut.

He came around to Mrs. Patmore's desk, and handed the bottle of lukewarm weak tea to Thomas, who coaxed the child to take it. After a little more fussing, she did so.

Meanwhile, the agent had located the pamphlet in Mrs. Patmore's desk. He flourished it at Nanny. "This pamphlet?"

"Yes, Mr. Branson."

"Show me where it says to feed an infant honey?"

She took the pamphlet from him, and turned to the page on which he had crossed out the word honey and written in block capitals half an inch high not to feed his daughter honey. She looked up at him but didn't speak. He saw a tear run down her cheek and remembered someone telling him that this was her first job.

Sybbie spat out the nipple and gave two more mighty yells, but when Thomas gently urged her to take it again, she obliged. Her father's attention turned back to the nanny.

"It won't happen again, Mr. Branson," the girl said firmly, sniffing back her tears.

The Irishman accepted her assurance with the words, "Praise Jesus."

Then he did something that proved to Mrs. Patmore more than anything else could that he was poor born. He picked up the rejected bottle of milk and honey, pulled off the rubber nursing nipple, and drank off the contents. He winked at Daisy as he set bottle and nurser on the counter by the sink to be washed. "Waste not, want not," he said with a smile. "I apologize for our disturbing your kitchen, Mrs. Patmore. Thank you, Mr. Barrow. You were a big help." He accepted his daughter back from Mr. Barrow, and collecting the rather crestfallen nanny, disappeared back upstairs.

Thomas looked after them, then back at Daisy and Mrs. Patmore. "Fains I ever ignore an order from Mr. Branson," he joked.

"Or me," Daisy agreed.

"Or me," Mrs. Patmore said.


End file.
